Quinn McDowell

Classroom

McDowell is on pace to graduate with a 3.26 GPA in Religious Studies and a minor in Economics. He was named to the CAA all-academic first team in 2011 after receiving second-team honors in 2010.

Character

As a junior, McDowell was named the winner of the Dean Ehlers Leadership Award, which is the highest honor given to a CAA basketball student-athlete. The distinction, which has been presented to the deserving men’s and women’s basketball player since 1995, is named after former James Madison athletic director Dean Ehlers, who was a founding member of the conference. The award is given to the student-athlete who “embodies the highest standards of leadership, integrity and sportsmanship in conjunction with his academic athletic achievement.” A player who W&M coach Tony Shaver calls the best leader he has ever coached in 35 years, McDowell was voted a team captain by his teammates in both 2010-11 and 2011-12. As a junior last season, he was also voted the team MVP by his teammates. He is also leader in the campus community both academically and athletically. McDowell is one of the select students at W&M to serve as a President’s aide as a member of the W&M President’s Council. McDowell was selected as a men’s basketball delegate to the W&M’s Student-Athlete Advisory Council. Each of the last two years he has served as the service chair and is the vice president this year. McDowell is the President of the Tribe Fellowship student organization on campus and works with Evan Muro, the College Minister to students from the Williamsburg Community Chapel.

Community

McDowell is heavily involved in the Williamsburg community. He works with youth at the Williamsburg Community Chapel, leading a Bible study group comprised of high school students that meets once a week on Sunday nights. He also organizes and leads team Bible studies. In the summer of 2009 and 2011, McDowell, along with his roommate and Tribe teammate JohnMark Ludwick, led a small group of high school students from the Williamsburg Community Chapel on mission trips to Nicaragua. Each of the last two summers, McDowell organized W&M men’s basketball student-athletes’ involvement in local chapters of the Boys & Girls Club and he has spent time at St. Mary’s Home for Disabled Children in Norfolk, Va. Through his work with the W&M Student-Athlete Advisory Council, McDowell helped in organizing the Tribe-band initiative that raised between $30,000 and $35,000 to help endow the First Lieutenant Todd W. Weaver Memorial Scholarship. Lt. Weaver, who graduated from the College Phi Beta Kappa in 2008 before enlisting in the Army, was killed in Afghanistan in September of 2010. Overall, approximately $50,000 was raised for the endowment, and the income received from the endowment will provide study-abroad opportunities for William & Mary students interested in government and international relations.

Competition

The leading returning scorer in the CAA at 15.5 points per game last season, McDowell enters the season on the All-CAA first team. He is one of the leading returning career scorers in the country at 1,221 points, which ranks 16th in school history. Quinn is the only returning CAA player with multiple All-CAA selections, earning third-team honors in both 2010 and 2011. McDowell rates as one of the top shooters in the country. Last season, he became only the second player in CAA history, and one of only three nationally in 2010-11, to lead his respective league in three-point field goal percentage (45.5) and free throw percentage (86.6). He was also one of only five players in the country last season to shoot at least 45 percent from the field (47.5), 45 percent from three-point range and 85 percent from the free-throw line. He enters his senior season as W&M’s all-time leader in 3-point field goal percentage (43 percent), which currently ranks fifth in CAA history. As a sophomore, McDowell helped W&M to only its second-ever postseason appearance in the 2010 National Invitational Tournament.